چکیده:
Introduction Some times in spite of investment failure (lose of time and money) people insist on endurance of investment failure (representative of gamblers behavior). This phenomenon was known "Sunk Cost". The aim of the current research was to investigate the cause of sunk cost via experimental research. Method The sample was 180 students of educational science and psychology of university of Isfahan selected randomly. Experimental design was some wignet scenario about incomplete project and ask them to decide about it. It is assumed that prior money allocations with percent increment in cost, the probability of reinvestment was added. Results Finding via one way ANOVA and second degree and linearal regression analysis show that prior money allocation did not accept as lost, so invest additional resource in the hope of erasing their loses. Results were explained by contribution of to theories, namely: cognitive dissonance and self justification.
خلاصه ماشینی:
Introduction Sunk costs1 are a type of abnormal behavioral tendency that typically affect individuals' decision-making processes regarding the continuation of investment in inefficient and suboptimal projects.
This behavioral tendency is inconsistent with the principles and theories of classical decision-making, because sunk costs, due to excessive focus on past consumed costs and lack of attention to the final benefits and losses of the project, lead to the adoption of weak and inefficient decisions.
That is, in cognitive closure bias, individuals reinvest in order to justify their past performance and compensate for losses resulting from previous investments in a failed project (Kai 3, 2010), whereas the psychological basis of sunk costs is the individual's tendency not to accept the waste of previous investments (Coleman 4, 2010).
Studies conducted in various fields such as personal decisions (Arkes & Ayton 7, 1999; Bornstein & Chapman 8, 1994) and decisions related to commercial investment (Staw 1976; Garland, 1990) have confirmed the effect of sunk costs as a cognitive bias in the decision-making process.
Furthermore, decision-makers who personally 1- Escalation of Commitment 2- Blake House 3- Kai 4- Coleman 5- Ayer 6- Martin 7 Ayton 8- Bornstein & Chapman regarding the consequences of their decisions in the project were held responsible, they were more influenced by sunk costs in the decision-making process compared to other non-responsible individuals.
Some researchers have introduced the subject of status quo bias 5 as one of the underlying reasons for the sunk cost phenomenon, in which individuals' threshold for accepting new options in the decision-making process is very high, and conversely, their tendency to pursue previous strategies is greater (Karvold and Teigen, 2010).
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